Phil Copple
Biography
Phil Copple was appointed Director General Operations, HMPPS in August 2022.
Previously he had been the acting Director General of Prisons since January 2019. Phil has worked in offender management for nearly 30 years. He joined the Prison Service in 1990 as a prison officer before undertaking a range of managerial posts at different prisons, as well as Headquarters. He took up his first Governor post at HMYOI Deerbolt in 2000. He was Governor of HMP Frankland from 2002 to 2006, after which he became Area Manager for North East prisons and then the North East Director of Offender Management within the National Offender Management Service (NOMS) with responsibility for both prisons and probation in the region.
Phil became a member of the NOMS Board in 2011 and served as Director of National Operational Services, Director of High Security, Director of Public Sector Prisons and Chief Operating Officer. He had a short spell seconded to the Ministry of Justice’s Strategy Unit working on prison strategy in 2015.